Stick to the knitting

Stick to the knitting is an American business adage that means concentrate on one’s core business or on what one knows best and is first cited in this sense from 1867, and from even 40 years earlier in the form of ‘mind your knitting’. The concept itself, however, could well be very much older because the Greek painter Apelles is credited by Pliny the Elder to have said, “Let the cobbler stick to his last” i.e. stick to shoe-making because that is what a cobbler does best.